The following information came from HERE, with some editing and information added. Thanks Christian!

THIS MAY NEED UPDATING FOR THE NEW BLACK CRC CARPET

Brands:

BSR, CRC, Jaco:

Pro One is no longer selling to the public, but it and the brands above are all mounted by BSR and use the same foam. The nomenclature of the BSR vs Jaco/CRC is a little different in a few instances but is otherwise the same. The BSR foam consists of three families, and can be identifed as synthetics, naturals, and blends.

Synthetics - The old school, light weight, easy to true "dry feeling" tires. These include tires like CRC/Jaco Yellow (BSR White), Black, Gray, etc. These tires offer the highest wear rate and lowest grip. Many racers continue to use these nder high bite conditions.

Naturals - These tires are usually the best alternative for low bite and asphalt. They include Pink, Magenta, Double Pink, Lilac (BSR Team Purple), Purple, and other tires. These tires provide a ton of grip, but tend to get sticky in high bite conditions. This rubber does not wear as easily, and the cars will pick up gunk and fibers from the carpet under most high bite conditions. This is especially bad if the humidity is high.

Blends - These are the tires most people run today. They were initially called "JFT foam" by some, as it was believed that the tires were the same as the JFT tires. We can divide the blends further into two groups: high rubber and low rubber content. The high rubber would be the new rear Orange and Red from the BSR family, and the low rubber would be the Green and Blue varieties. When, asked about the difference, John Foister from BSR Tires said they came from the same "family" of foam, but they offered different grip. According to John, the Green/Blue has more bite than Orange/Red, but from track testing Oranges offer more bite than Green (being equivalent to in hardness) when the grip is high and absolutely no grip when it is lower. The Orange foam has a denser pore structure and the tire is not as prone to chunking. It is also important to note is that BSR Blue rears are not the same as the BSR Blue fronts!

JFT:

JFT stands for Japan Foam Tire. They started the new wave of foam tires we are all using now (Blue/Blu, Green/Greene, Dbl Blue, etc). These tires are a little different than the BSR tire family, but work in very similar conditions. They offers four varieties A (asphalt), C (carpet), S (???), and R (???). This does not mean that those types only work on that surface, but this is what they recommend.

JFT uses the same foam for fronts and rears if the color is the same.

A: Used on asphalt, considered close to the natural rubber variety and are named consistently with other natural tires.C: Used on carpet, considered a blend.S: Used on carpet?, tires are ???R: Used on carpet?, tires are ???

For setup, the JFT foam seem to generate more bite than the BSR, therefore the car tends to be a little more aggressive.

Ulti:

Ulti is another Japanese brand that offers an array of compounds. They have their own way of rating tires, and are difficult to equate to other brands. They have 4 different varieties, each in varying degrees of hardness.

J: High rubber content tire, similar to Pink/ Magenta. Soft would be close to a pink. These offer the most bite and are great for asphalt/carpet front tire. (J hard being very popular)X: "Balanced" blend, similar to JFT Blue/ Green. Soft is equivalent to Green, medium to Blue in hardness. Great for carpet!Y: High synthetic blend with lower grip, and is not a very popular variety.Z: A very expensive "special" foam that is supposed to be magic on asphalt. Only make it in soft shore.

European tires:

There are many great European foam tire brands that use their own types of foam, as well as traditional foams. SOmeone with more knowledge about them will need to fill this in!

Tire Diameter:

If you are racing on carpet, you have to evaluate how much grip your track has. If your track is low to medium grip, you can run bigger tires. If you are on higher bite you have to cut them smaller, there is simply no way around it. Bigger tires are needed for asphalt, especially in the rear. The larger tires provide much needed lateral bite.

Carpet (mm):

Low - Medium Bite

Front: 42.0 - 42.5
Rear: 42.5 - 43.00

Medium - High Bite

Front: 40.5 - 41.0
Rear: 41.5 - 42.0

Big Race

Front: 39.5 - 40.0
Rear: 40.5 - 41.0

Asphalt (mm):

Parking Lot

Front: 43.0 - 44.0
Rear: 44.0 - 45.0

Prepped High Bite

Front: 42.0 - 43.0
Rear: 43.0 - 44.0

Tire Saucing:

Most facilities have moved towards odorless traction additives such as SXT. Some of additives evaporate very quickly and some do not. This seems to be something that is also dependent on tire compound and ambient temperature. For example, saucing a Green compound seems like it never dries, especially when tjhe temperature is lower. We have found that wiping the tires off 15 minutes before we go run allows the sauce to cure, which makes the car come in much quicker with Green rears. Blue compounds on the other hand, do fine when wiped off right before hitting the track.

Saucing half front and full rear is a good initial starting point. If the front of the car is too agressive you can sauce les than half, or for a shorter amount of time.

Tire Fuzzing:

In conditions of increasing grip, foam tires will somewtimes get sticky and pick up fuzz and debris from the track. This is highly dependent on the rubber sedan tire that is being run at your local track and the compound/ type of foam you are running on you car. The softer the sedan tire and the harder/higher rubber content in your foam tire, trouble with fuzzing seems more likely to occur.

There are ways to get around fuzzing under most conditions, and usually involves the selection of the correct foam compound. The more fuzz you get, the softer/lower rubber content you want to run.

Examples:
Problem: Car fuzzes with Lilac/Team Purple fronts and car starts pushing.
Solution: Use a softer front tire and or different family of foam. Replace it with Blue or Double Blue front.

You may wonder about other compounds out there and if they might be better, trust me, they probably won't be. Even if there are other tires that can be as fast, the synthetic family wears out really fast and the high natural rubber will probably fuzz on you over an 8 minute run. The blends family seems to be the most versatile foam type available today. They last awhile, and sticking to them will make your process of tire selection simpler.

Tire Charts:

BSR/CRC/Jaco

Contact

Corally

JFT (Japan Foam Tire)

Ulti

Enneti (Xceed)

ELECTRONICS:

ESC:

As of now, ROAR is staying 1S (3.7V nominal; 4.2V fully charged) for 1/12. There are many 1S ESC's with a built in BEC so nothing else is required to power the receiver and servo.

If you don't want to lock yourself into a 1S specific ESC, you do have other options! It is possible to use your 2S ESC without a booster or receiver pack, and the ESC simply supplies the lower voltage. If that does not appeal to you, you will need to use an Rx pack or booster. The Rx pack and booster will both supply the receiver with a higher voltage than the 1S pack.

If you decide to use an Rx pack, MAKE SURE TO REMOVE THE RED WIRE FROM THE ESC PLUG THAT GOES INTO THE RECEIVER!!!

If you choose to use a voltage booster, it works exactly how it sounds. Instead of plugging the ESC into the receiver, it plugs into the booster, and the booster plug goes to the ESC, supplying the higher voltage.

Scott I've been running my Darkside Mx2 on asphalt with pink or magenta rears with purple fronts. I use the same tire treatment proceedure as Cypress treating the full rear and the inside half of the front tires.

To answer the Corally diff nut coming undone question from the previous page, put a little drop of super glue on the thread, let it dry and then do the nut up on the thread. The glue will make the nut a bit tighter and should n't come undone again, unless you want it to, of course!

You know back in the day (80's), we always used sunscreen outdoors on our 1/12,1/10 pan car foams. I still don't understand why everyone is afraid to run 1/12 outdoors? We used to run on tracks that were literally off road with the ripples and cracks with rc 12 e's that had no suspension to speak of and survived( and created traction).

I recenty raced at a local track here in Jackson, NJ which has a great permanent on road track and I hear people complain that it is bumpy? I didn't think so, but that is my opinion. Just raise the ride height and drive the car. You may scratch the plate, but these cars are not museum pieces. Heck even f1 marks up the barge boards.

I guess when all of the commercial tracks pack it in from no support, we'll have no choice but to run on parking lots. Just a thought.

Race is the Sizzler in Seattle/Tacoma so I'll bring my umbrella and galoshes

Saving the sunscreen for here...heading into yet another triple-digit temp day. I was outside all weekend in 100+ doing race director and announcing duties for the Montana State Offroad Champs. Ay yi yi...fat guys from Seattle STILL ain't used to this heat. Or the sub-zero in winter.

Thanks for the pointers. I'll set up both the Darkside and one of the 3.2R's. What I should PROBABLY do is put the YRX back together so I have a T-bar car...but I hate T-bars

Oh yeah, we don't use Paragon here...scent-free for 2 years now. What will I want to use on asphalt?

Well you may want some sunscreen, it is warming up here again, I don't know if you were up here for the ROAR Nats, but the week of it was 80+++

sunscreen will keep the pargon in the tire longer. as the pargon sits on the tire two things are going on, one it socking into the tire and two it evapaing into the air. By putting sunscreen on top of the last bit of pargon its letting the rest of it go into the tires and not into the air which will give you longer traction outdoors. just make sure to get aloe free sunscreen.

coppertone 15 or 45 the old stuff works best as it has no added aloe,or bug stuff in it

indoors carpet there no need for it as the carpet will have stuff in the track from everyone running on it. if its asphalt sunscreen will work but make sure to wipe all of it off as sunscreen will pick up all the dirt sitting off line.

indoors carpet there no need for it as the carpet will have stuff in the track from everyone running on it. if its asphalt sunscreen will work but make sure to wipe all of it off as sunscreen will pick up all the dirt sitting off line.

THanks Tim it is Asaphault, I will have to try that, also I ususally clean my rubber tires with some Simple Green, will that work to clean foam as well?

You know back in the day (80's), we always used sunscreen outdoors on our 1/12,1/10 pan car foams. I still don't understand why everyone is afraid to run 1/12 outdoors? We used to run on tracks that were literally off road with the ripples and cracks with rc 12 e's that had no suspension to speak of and survived( and created traction).

I recenty raced at a local track here in Jackson, NJ which has a great permanent on road track and I hear people complain that it is bumpy? I didn't think so, but that is my opinion. Just raise the ride height and drive the car. You may scratch the plate, but these cars are not museum pieces. Heck even f1 marks up the barge boards.

I guess when all of the commercial tracks pack it in from no support, we'll have no choice but to run on parking lots. Just a thought.

dominick
theres nothing like old rolled up firehose and Discplow blades to make a track.

ooooohhhhhh the joys of hitting the Disc with a 1/12 mod running a hot 22 turn motor (yes back then 22 turns where the hot motors in mod) the good old days